‘We are always overlooked’: Youth of Loyiso Nkohla settlement say there’s no use in them voting

CAPE TOWN - Some young people from Loyiso Nkohla informal settlement in Stock Road say they've had enough of the government's empty promises, and won't be taking part in the upcoming general elections.
 
They are part of a group of people who had erected their shacks on railway tracks in Nyanga and Philippi and were relocated to land owned by the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (PRASA) alongside Stock Road station.
 
South Africans will head to the polls on 29 May in what has been described as the most highly contested elections in the country's 30 years of democracy.
 
More than 11 million eligible voters are between 18 and 39 years old.
 
Eyewitness News visited the new settlement named after slain community activist and politician, Loyiso Nkohla, to hear some of the challenges facing the youth there.

UNFULFILLED PROMISES IN POOR CONDITIONS
 
As you enter the crammed Loyiso Nkohla informal settlement on Stock Road, you find many young people wandering about with nothing much to do.
 
Eyewitness News spoke to a group of young men seated between some shacks trying to find shade from the sun.
 
Some showed clear disdain for the electoral process, with one young man saying he was not bothered about making his X on the 29th.
 
"We won't vote so that a selected few can enrich themselves while we are living in these poor conditions. I don't see the need for us to vote, we don't even work." 
 
Another young man, known as Ayabonga, said all the promises made to them when they moved had not been fulfilled.
 
"We were promised formal housing, electricity, and water supply when we moved. But the situation here is worse than where we come from."

Another young man, Siyabonga Magubu, said he would not vote for people who were only looking out for themselves.
 
"There are no job opportunities for us, we are always overlooked, even for community projects."